


Bodega Cat

by Mozzarella



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Anders is in love, Cats, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fenris works at a bodega, Fluff, M/M, Pets, Ser Pounce is the bodega cat, also Fenris is there, with the cat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-14 12:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29667282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mozzarella/pseuds/Mozzarella
Summary: Anders goes to the bodega to see the love of his life.... Ser Pounce the bodega cat.Also Fenris is there.
Relationships: Anders/Fenris (Dragon Age)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 48





	Bodega Cat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [halwardpavushatersclub](https://archiveofourown.org/users/halwardpavushatersclub/gifts).



> Written for halwardpavushatersclub! You can get your own fic written especially for you as well.
> 
> Check out the pinned tweet @mothermuchy on Twitter for more info!

Anders felt sorry for the poor saps in the world who didn’t believe love was real. If you opened your heart to it, true love could surprise you in the most unexpected of places, and a younger, sluttier, more jaded Anders wouldn’t have expected to run into the love of his life in a run-down bodega on an especially nasty street corner in Kirkwall’s worst borough. 

But then, there was something to be said about finding light in the darkness (or in this case, Kirkwall’s colloquial Darktown), and discovering someone so elegant, so beautiful, so unimaginably sweet, and warm, and loving, in what was, respectfully, a shithole. 

Visiting HAWKE’S  AMELL’S was one of the only highlights in Anders’ day, the only reason for him to wake up in the morning that wasn’t his job or his advocacy. Something just for him, something that brought him joy; with coffee that should’ve been unfit for human consumption at the price it was being sold but was surprisingly a solid mediocre and fresh bread baked by someone who did better magic than Anders ever could - the magic of excellent culinary proficiency. 

Who cares if he could literally knit skin back together and heal fatal wounds in an emergency room? Merrill’s Dalish cheese rolls were to die for.    
  


Every day, Anders woke in his teensy, closet-sized apartment, dressed himself to look convincingly as though he wasn’t knocking on death’s door (even if Taint was now a manageable condition and he could even be called healthy, that didn’t mean he  _ look  _ it), and walked over to HAWKE’S hoping to catch a glimpse of the love of his life. 

And more often than not, he’d see him - perched on the counter or on the piles of unpacked supplies near the back room, looking as beautiful and perfect as ever. 

Ser Pounce. 

A sight so radiant that not even the scowling face of the elf who was always at the counter or stocking the shelves at the free morning hour Anders had to stop by could dim his glee. 

“Anders,” said Fenris flatly, shaking his head as Anders beelined straight for the sweet, round-eyed cat. Pounce perked up, sniffing at Anders’ hand and then butting his head against it, a rumbly pur warming Anders to the core as he gave the lovely little tabby the scritches it deserved. 

“Fenris,” Anders returned, snorting just a little. They’d certainly graduated from “Mage” and “Elf” from the first time Hawke took over the broken down store and brought it back to life, and Anders had had to contend with an elf who glared at him every time he dropped off flyers for the Mage Underground activist group meetings to pile on the counter. It was a wonder Fenris didn’t just throw the piles away the first time, but when Anders learned that Hawke himself was a mage, it wasn’t hard to see why. 

“The usual today?” Fenris said in the same tone - smooth yet dry, sounding bored when he wasn’t disdainful or enraged, which were the three states Anders had seen him in in the last three years he’d been coming to HAWKE’S. 

“Will today be the day you finally poison me to put me out of your misery?” Anders wondered as Fenris prepared his drink, earning a snort of amusement that he counted as a victory. 

“I am not so cruel as to do that to Ser Pounce. He shouldn’t have to pay for your crimes by losing his best source of scritches,” Fenris said easily. 

“Ah yes, the crime of being a mage who exists,” Anders said. 

“No, Anders. The crime of your atrocious cat shirts and the feathers you insist on decorating your coat with,” Fenris said, causing Anders to blink at the other man in mute surprise. 

“The healing power of a cat pun cannot be underestimated,” Anders eventually said, gamely, before shrugging as he added, “And it’s not as though I’ve the budget to get a new coat when the one I’ve got still works to keep me warm. These aren’t feathers, by the way. The fluff has just seen one too many cheap washings.” 

Fenris didn’t seem to know how to respond to that, opening his mouth then closing it, brows furrowing. Anders wasn’t entirely sure what was going through his mind then, but for once, his comparatively subdued mood didn’t seem directed at Anders, with Fenris giving him an almost cordial nod as he handed him his coffee, along with a little brown bag that was warm to the touch and smelled absolutely divine. 

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t order a - oh Maker, that’s a Dalish cheese roll, isn’t it?” Anders said, close to shedding tears over the treat he was depriving himself of. It just wasn’t in the budget today, but he planned to treat himself if things got really bad at the clinic. 

“It’s fine, Merrill made extra, and you’ve already used the bag,” said Fenris flippantly. “Take it.” 

Anders stopped, looking wide-eyed at Fenris, who dodged the look by settling on Ser Pounce, who began to meow plaintively as Anders moved away from the counter. Anders stopped, returned to give Pounce a particularly good scritch behind his ears, then said his goodbyes, giving Fenris a nod and an uncertain “Thank you” as he made his way to work. 

* * *

Every day Anders came to the bodega was a good one, with Ser Pounce always eager to receive his rightful pets and Fenris rolling his eyes in a way that had none of his earlier animosity. Anders didn’t know the full extent of Fenris’s experiences with magic, and at the time was too incensed by his open bigotry to think much on it. 

It was Hawke who gave Anders an inkling, at one point coming to the store around the same time Anders came for his coffee and congratulating Fenris on “the magister’s untimely and suspiciously violent death.” 

Slavery had been outlawed in Tevinter decades ago, but that didn’t account for the atrocities many magisters were known for under what was essentially wage-slavery, especially for the families of elves who inherited generational poverty. And given the scar tissue Fenris hid under long sleeves, whose shapes (or what little Anders saw when the sleeves bunched up) were too detailed to be accidental, well. 

Anders had stopped trying to argue with Fenris after that, and Fenris had eased up on his harsher words, the two of them even calling each other by name by the end of the second year. 

HAWKE’S was a strangely soothing place to come to, especially since, even in the sketchy, undeniably dangerous area that was Darktown, it appeared to be a neutral zone. Nobody messed with Hawke or anything under Hawke’s protection, and Anders - having seen the extent of the violence that could go down in the area from those who visited his clinic - didn’t dare question it. 

One time, a particularly idiotic robber attempted to rob the place while Fenris was doing an overnight shift, and Anders - in need of a pick-me-up after getting home from a late night at the clinic - dropped by for a therapeutic Ser Pounce cuddle and immediately put up a barrier as the idiot tried to shoot Fenris with an unsteady hand. 

Fenris moved quickly, so quickly Anders barely caught it before the idiot was thrown bodily out the door, Fenris masterfully unloading the magazine and then cracking the would-be robber across the forehead with the butt of his own gun. 

They got the man taken in fairly quickly, and Anders suspected it had something to do with the bar across the street and the shrewd dwarf giving them a wave from the second-floor apartment. 

“I didn’t need your help,” Fenris said sharply when Anders went to check if he had any major injuries. He found an ugly bruise where the bullet hit Fenris’s shoulder, but thanks to the barrier it didn’t do much more than that. Anders used the last of his mana to heal it just a touch, enough so the worst was over and Fenris would have something much milder in comparison. “But thank you,” he said at length, sighing. “I… you didn’t have to do what you did. And I appreciate it.” 

“I didn’t do it for you,” Anders lied. “I just worried the idiot would hurt Pounce somehow, the way he was waving that gun around.” 

Fenris snorted. “Indeed. Wouldn’t want Ser Pounce to get hurt. Then we’d have to raze the city to the ground.” 

“Glad we’re on the same page,” Anders said seriously, patting Fenris on the uninjured shoulder. The elf’s face darkened, and he turned away. If Anders didn’t know any better, he’d think the man was… blushing? 

* * *

The incident with the robber proved that Fenris could absolutely fend for himself, so the first day in a good long while he didn’t come into work, Anders didn’t worry too much. Sure, he did a little snooping to see if Fenris was hiding out in the back, and sure he was a little surprised (not disappointed!) when Isabela came out, saying she was covering for their favourite broody elf while he took care of some business. 

But he wasn’t worried. 

Then a week went by. Then two. If it wasn’t Isabela, it was Merrill. Anders got his Ser Pounce pets in every time, so it wasn’t such a big deal that their coffee wasn’t nearly as good (well, good was a stretch, but they were  _ fine _ ) as Fenris’, and he couldn’t ask about where the elf was without admitting that they had the kind of relationship where he’d  _ care  _ that he’d gone. 

Then one day, Hawke barged in while Isabela flirted outrageously, cradling a perfectly content Pounce in her arms and against her ample bosom.

Turns out, the rise of HAWKE’S from the run-down AMELL’S came from an inheritance Hawke had been hell-bent on making something out of, and the lawyers handling old Amell wills and contracts dug up an old deed in their name for an estate in the fancier part of Kirkwall. Add to that a business deal Hawke helped broker with Varric that didn’t seem entirely legal (but then, who was Anders to judge?), and Hawke was swimming in it. 

It was a wonder that he wanted to keep up the bodega at all, but even after the revelation of obscene wealth, Hawke kept HAWKE’S running with slightly better accommodations, better pay for its few workers (who were part of Hawke’s circle of friends plus a few new faces), and, to Anders’s delight, a fancy little raised bed by the front window where Ser Pounce could lounge and look upon his domain, eyes tracking passers-by on the sidewalk. 

Hawke even gave Anders his own special “Ser-Pounce-approved-discount”, which he claimed was for keeping the best cat in all of Thedas company, but was also for running the one clinic that patched people up no questions asked - even Hawke, back when he owned exactly nothing and ran around the shithole like the rest of them. 

Even with all that good news over the last few months, Anders still found himself wondering where Fenris had gone. Because if he was ever going to be honest with himself, rubbing gentle thumbs into Ser Pounce’s cheeks and staring at the cat’s beautiful, deeply compassionate eyes… he missed the elf. 

And as though Pounce was himself magic and granted wishes (which Anders didn’t doubt for a second), the very next day, Anders found himself standing across a wide-eyed Fenris, as the two stopped in front of the newly installed, branded bodega window from which Pounce watched avidly from above. 

He looked… better. His clothes were subdued, but new, and he was a bit less of a skeleton, even if most of the elves Anders knew tended thin. In one hand, he held a coffee cup, which he held out to Anders without a word, looking a bit flustered. Anders raised an eyebrow. 

He mumbled something incoherent and seemed immediately to regret it. “Sorry?” Anders asked, unsure of where this strange interaction was headed. 

“Neither Isabela nor Merrill make it right,” said Fenris. “Though it might not be what you’re used to.” 

With a raised brow that didn’t fall, Anders took a sip, and could cry right here in the middle of the street at just how good it was. Of course. Of course Fenris could make a shit cup mediocre, and with better materials, make a decent cup decadent. 

It didn’t entirely explain, however, what he was doing here now. 

“It turns out, using your elf assistant’s name to engage in questionable asset transfers can and will backfire on you if you die quite suddenly,” said Fenris when they sat down on the one stone wall of the park that wasn’t covered end to end in bird shit. “I somehow found myself inheriting everything the bastard magister owned, including a property in Hightown I don’t know what to do with. It was all too much. I apologise for being absent,” he added quietly. 

Anders shrugged, trying to take it all in. He had Pounce sleeping soundly in his lap - taken from the bodega while Hawke flirted outrageously with both Merill and Isabela, too distracted to see Anders’ catnap occur in real time. “Fenris, you don’t need to apologise for not taking an hour’s ride train from the fanciest place in Kirkwall to its back end just to come to an early morning shift at a rundown bodega.” 

“Not for that,” said Fenris, turning slightly to face Anders. He reached out, giving Pounce a thoughtful scritch, his hand dangerously close to where Anders had his resting by Pounce’s tail. 

“I apologise for leaving Ser Pounce with Merill and Isabela for so long,” he went on gently, the tone too sincere for the joke it was meant to be. The joke they both shared for so long that they knew too well, even without admitting it, what it meant right below the surface. “I wasn’t sure if he’d want to see me again after I left. If it was worth the travel, or taking time out of his busy schedule when things had gotten so… complicated.” 

“Well…” Anders began, allowing his long, bony fingers to accidentally brush against Fenris’ as Pounce stirred, butting his head into Anders’ hand for a proper, deep scritch behind the head. “I think Pounce missed you. And doesn’t mind you coming round every now and then to bring him treats.” 

Fenris chuckled, likely imagining Anders as a cat, an image which would bring Anders no end of joy. 

“Maybe he could come visit you sometime as well?” he wondered. Fenris beamed, the first time Anders had ever seen him smile. It was beautiful as he was, warm and vibrant yet soft and secret. 

“Well, Ser Pounce?” Fenris cooed, and Pounce meowed up at both of them, clearly in agreement. “Well then, how can I refuse?”    
  



End file.
